The School of Science at MIT continues to play a leadership role in science
education and research both nationally and internationally. Our faculty
received a broad array of honors and awards during the past year, the most
notable being the receipt of the 1995 Nobel Prize in Chemistry by Mario J.
Molina Professor of EAPS and Chemistry. This is the first Nobel Prize in
Chemistry awarded to one of our faculty. The 1995 NRC study of Research
Doctorate Programs in the United States showed that our graduate programs quite
broadly are ranked among the top few in the Nation. The one exception is
neuroscience where we are in a building phase. Of course, maintaining this
high standard in the future will require continued dedication and diligence by
all of the members of our community, especially in an era of diminishing
resources.

Our education programs continue to evolve and improve in response to
ever-changing conditions. Mathematics has extensively revised introductory
calculus 18.01 and has introduced an "intermediate difficulty" freshman
calculus sequence 18.01A and 18.02A. Biology has been successfully introduced
into the core curriculum and is continuing quite successfully. One result of
adding Biology to the core is a dramatic increase in the number of Biology
majors over the past two years. Physics introduced a major change in the
structure of 8.01 with most of the teaching taking place in small sections of ~
20 students. Further refinement of this novel approach is underway. EAPS is
revamping its educational program, especially at the graduate level, with an
emphasis on a systems approach. In particularly, EAPS is in the process of
introducing a professional masters degree in Geosystems. BCS has revamped its
Cognitive Science major dividing it into four core areas and is designing a
neuroscience major to be introduced in FY1997. Overall, after EECS, the
departments with the largest number of undergraduate student contact hours at
MIT are, in order, Mathematics, Physics, Biology and Chemistry. Thus, the
School of Science continues to carry a major part of the undergraduate teaching
responsibility at MIT.

In 1993 the School of Science established the "School of Science Teaching Prize
for Graduate Education" to complement the prize for undergraduate education
established by John Deutch in 1983. The 1996 winner of this award was
Professor Marcia McNutt of EAPS. The School of Science Teaching Prize for
Undergraduate Education was won by John Essigmann of Chemistry and Toxicology.
Two School of Science faculty were chosen as MacVicar fellows in FY96; they are
Rick Danheiser and Bob Silbey.

The quality of an academic enterprise such as the School of Science is
determined primarily by the caliber of the faculty who make it up. Thus, one
of the highest priorities of the current administration in the School has been
to support properly our existing outstanding faculty as well as recruiting to
MIT exceptionally talented young educators and researchers including especially
women and underrepresented minorities. In 1995-96 seven new faculty joined the
School as assistant professors; one as an associate professor; and two
additional faculty were appointed as full professors. We also have had to
stave off an unprecedented number of outside offers to our most distinguished
faculty.

One of the most significant events of the recent past was the formation of the
Committee on Women Faculty in the School of Science. This committee was
created as the result of an initiative which involved all of the senior women
in the School of Science. The committee has multiple purposes and
responsibilities. First, the committee has collected data to be used in
assessing the status and equitable treatment of women faculty in the School of
Science. Second, the committee is facilitating communications between the
women faculty and the dean and department heads. Third, the committee is
acting as a resource for the Dean of Science and the department heads.
Finally, the committee is also serving as a resource to the MIT community as a
whole to provide advice about issues of concern to women faculty at MIT. The
committee's first official report is due shortly.

There are many new research initiatives in the School of Science. One of the
most significant is our newly established partnership with the Carnegie
Institution, the Harvard Smithsonian, the University of Michigan and the
University of Arizona in the Magellan Project; this involves the design and
construction of twin 6.5m telescopes at Los Campanas in Chile. In addition,
the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) is scheduled to be one of the premier
scientific experiments on the International Space Station to be launched in
2001. The AMS project, which involves an international consortium, will look
for anti-matter and dark matter candidates above the Earth's atmosphere. MIT,
in partnership with the Whitehead Institute, continues to play a leading role
in genome research. A new three-year 26 million dollar program to begin
sequencing specific portions of the human genome has begun.

There were 913 undergraduates in the School of Science during the
past academic year, a 1.44% increase from the previous year. The number of
minority students at the undergraduate level changed as follows:

Blacks

Increased
from 25 to 37 (48.00% increase)

Hispanics

No
change (48)

Native
Americans

Increased
from 7 to 8 (14.29% increase)

Asian
Americans

Increased
from 276 to 289 (4.71% increase)

The female undergraduate population increased from 372 to 418 (12.37%). Twenty
percent of the Institute's upperclass undergraduates were enrolled in the
School of Science.

Graduate enrollments in science decreased from 1,084 to 1,059. The total
enrollment represents 20 percent of the graduate population at MIT. The number
of minority students at the graduate level changed as follows:

Blacks

No
change

Hispanics

Increased
from 14 to 19 (35.71% increase)

Native
Americans

No
change

Asian
Americans

Increased
from 47 to 51 (8.51% increase)

The number of female graduate students increased from 245 to 316 (28.98%).

There were 277 faculty members in the School this past year. This represents a
slight increase from the previous year. The undergraduate student-to-faculty
ratio was 3 to 1, and the graduate student-to-faculty ratio was 4 to 1.

Research Volume

The FY96 research volume was $123 million, a 2% decline over the FY95 research
volume.